This is what we can do to end the reading crisis

As the November 2023 deadline looms, 70% of public schools still don’t have libraries By Tatiana Kazim On 30 August, the Right to Read campaign was launched at the Women’s Jail in Johannesburg. The campaign brings together several organisations, including the Legal Resources Centre, the Centre for Child Law, SECTION27, Equal Education (EE), and Equal Education Law Centre (EELC) to mobilise civil...

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Court decision is major victory for Eastern Cape learners

Makhanda High Court declares new school admission policy unconstitutional By Geoffrey Allsop Eastern Cape children who were prevented from attending school because they do not have identity documents won an important victory in the Makhanda High Court in December. Read the judgment In 2016, the Eastern Cape Basic Education Department introduced a new admission policy which said public schools would only receive funding for...

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Undocumented children win right to basic education

In a monumental ruling at the Makhanda high court, judges found it was unconstitutional to bar learners without birth certificates from receiving basic schooling. By Tania Broughton Thirty-seven children have changed the law for themselves and an estimated one million others in South Africa who have been deprived of an education because they are undocumented. In a ruling penned by Judge President...

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Court rules that child offenders, victims and witnesses may not be named – even in adulthood

Parliament given 24 months to correct Criminal Procedure Act By Tania Broughton Child offenders, child victims and child witnesses may not be named - even in adulthood, the Constitutional Court ruled on Wednesday. To sum up their majority ruling, the judges quoted Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie who during a TED talk in 2009 said: “Stories matter. Many stories matter. Stories have been used to...

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